Indemnity

“Prevention is better than a cure”, as they say, and whilst professional indemnity insurance gives you peace of mind, it pays to minimise risk from the outset.

Also, if you take steps to minimise the risk of a claim by acting professionally and document those steps, it may help your case if you should ever have to defend yourself in court.

The first key to reducing risk is documentation. All projects should be well documented as you go along, and you may want to assess risk at each stage. If at any point you believe that the risk around something you are doing is too high, you might want to consider discussing it with your client before going any further.

It is also worth dealing with complaints promptly – an unhappy customer is more likely to reach for a lawyer’s phone number if they think that’s the only way to get through to you.

Good, documented, project management will lead to understanding risk as another component of the project that needs to be managed, and this can have several direct effects:

• Reduce the chance of things going wrong
• When things go wrong, you manage the process of satisfying the customer and making things right
• If that fails and a client makes a claim against you, can show you acted in a professional manner

It’s also worth considering when to start the process of risk management. You may want to start it when negotiating the contract or planning the project: ensure that specific responsibilities are set out in the contract, and that there are clear means to resolving disputes that you can fulfil.

As ever, when negotiating contracts you should always take legal advice and ensure that you understand what has been agreed fully.